The new electric batteries that will wash away need for fossil fuels

This knocks out another myth: that the EV revolution is impossible on a planetary scale because there either is not enough lithium, or not enough at viable cost under free market conditions in states aligned with Western democracies. (The copper shortage is more serious, but there may be solutions for that as well using graphene with aluminium).

The International Energy Agency estimates that demand for lithium will rise 20-fold by 2040 if we rely on existing technology. The Australians are the world’s biggest producers today. But the greatest long-term deposits are in the Lithium Triangle of Argentina, Bolivia, and Chile, which are in talks to create an OPEC-style cartel. China’s Tianqi owns 22 per cent of the Chilean group SQM, the world’s second-biggest lithium miner.

A lithium recycling industry will mitigate the problem. Lithium can be extracted from seawater. It is highly diluted at 180 parts per billion but research suggests it could be isolated for as little as $US5 ($7.60) a kilo. If so, the lithium scare is just another of a long list of seemingly insurmountable barriers that fall away with time. The march of clean tech is littered with such false scares. For readers with a better grip on chemistry than me, the Argonne-IIT uses a solid electrolyte made from a ceramic polymer based on nanoparticles. This does require expensive materials. It achieves a reaction of four molecules at room temperature instead of the usual one or two. It is able to extract oxygen from the surrounding air to run the reaction, solving a problem that has held back development for a decade.

My advice to corporate bosses and ministers: keep up with the world’s scientific literature, or you will be massacred.

What the Argonne-IIT battery and other breakthroughs show is that energy science is moving so fast that what seemed impossible five years ago is already a discernible reality, and that we will be looking at a very different landscape before the end of this decade.

Germany and Italy last week succeeded in blocking EU plans for a ban on petrol and diesel sales by 2035. They might just as well bark at the moon. Moore’s Law and the learning curve of new technology has sealed the fate of the combustion engine – with or without net zero.

Loading

The legacy companies cannot save their sunk investment in fossil motors – unless the EU retreats into fortress protectionism, which would be economic suicide. To try would be to guarantee the destruction of Europe’s car industry.

The only hope of saving it is to go for broke on electrification before global rivals run away with the prize.

The coming battery technology kills the case for hydrogen in cars, vans, buses, or trucks, and perhaps also for trains and aircraft. The energy loss involved makes no sense.

It is much cheaper and more efficient to electrify wherever possible. Clean hydrogen is too valuable to squander. We need it to replace dirty hydrogen used in industry. We do not need it for road transport.

My advice to corporate bosses and ministers: keep up with the world’s scientific literature, or you will be massacred.

Telegraph, London

The Business Briefing newsletter delivers major stories, exclusive coverage and expert opinion. Sign up to get it every weekday morning.